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Article published March 28, 2013

Looker closer at issue

GG
Joel Rosenblum The Villages, Fla. Formerly of Butler

It looks like gay marriage is all the rage, with Hillary Clinton even coming out for it.Apparently, it’s the thing to do, with the Republican Party against it, but we also have an American public in growing majority as favoring same-sex marriage.Well, the main source and resource to justify punishing homosexuality in the first place has been the Bible, of course. And, if we want to tell the truth about Scriptures, the Bible is very clear in its objection to homosexuality.Leviticus condemns not homosexuality, but the behavior, the practice of such folks.We know the phrase “man should not lie down with another man” — this to be an abomination, according to Scripture.And, the Old Testament wasn’t the only reference. The disciple Paul is the most-quoted source in the New Testament as he stated that homosexual activity was regarded as a punishment visited upon idolaters by God because of their unfaithfulness.So, as indicated, this condition was not the sin but instead was deemed to be the punishment.There’s the Sodom and Gomorrah stuff, too — if we want to go into it. That story often is quoted to prove that the Bible condemns homosexuality.But the real sin of Sodom was the unwillingness of the city’s men to observe the laws of hospitality. The intention of the Sodomites — and this is weird — was to insult the stranger by forcing him to take the female role in the sex act.Strong stuff.Which leads to the point of it all: that in those pre-scientific times, people logically saw such activity as non-procreative, understandable in the tribal times when propagation was of the highest imperative.Still today part of society does not encourage responsible and faithful relations with persons of the same sex. That continues to make the situation for the homosexual very difficult.But times have moved on this issue, and a majority of Americans believe God created all of us equal, and that, then, it is the abuse of others through sexual crimes, etc., that is the abomination, not the love shared by two people.Heterosexuality has its own perversions. Indeed, straight people may act out in behaviors that are horribly sinful or brutal or exploitative. For here indeed is sin. That is sin: meaning freely acting contrary to one’s deeply held moral or ethical convictions, whether these come from organized religion or from a personal value system.Isn’t God pleased when each of us responds to his or her sexuality in ways that are life-giving or inspiring growth? Surely also there is righteousness here.The God of creation speaks and declares, “I have looked out on everything I have made behold that it is very good.”